Ionopsis utricularioides (Sw.) Lindl.
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Authority
Britton, Nathaniel L. Flora Borinqueña.
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Family
Orchidaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Species Description - A slender orchid, with long, narrow leaves, and small, but attractive white, pink, or lavender flowers, occasional on shrubs or trees, sometimes on rocky banks, in moist parts of Porto Rico, ascending to at least 700 meters elevation, it is distributed through the Greater Antilles, in southern Florida, on Martinique, St. Vincent, and Trinidad, and widely in tropical continental America. No popular names are recorded. Ionopsis (Greek, like a little violet, referring to the flowers) is a genus established by Humboldt, Bonpland and Kunth in 1815; it includes a few species of tropical and subtropical America. They have short stems, flat, or round leaves, and small, loosely clustered flowers borne on a long lateral scape. The 3 sepals are nearly alike, the lateral ones connate and saccate, the petals similar to the middle sepal; the lip, attached to the base of the short column, is 3-lobed, the middle lobe larger than the others; the 1-celled anther contains 2 waxy pollinia. The small capsule is oval, or oblong. Ionopsis utricularioides (the name from fancied resemblance of the flowers to those of some kinds of Bladderworts) has flat, keeled, pointed leaves from 5 to 15 centimeters long, and 0.5 to 3 centimeters wide, tapering to the base. The slender scape is from 20 to 40 centimeters long, and tears several, or many, loosely clustered flowers on very slender stalks from 5 to 10 millimeters long; the oblong, pointed sepals are about 6 millimeters long, with a blunt sac; the oblong- petals are tipped; the lip is from 10 to 13 millimeters long, about as wide as long, its lobes rounded. The oval capsule is about 2 centimeters long. Another species, Ionopsis satyroides, with slender, nearly cylinderic leaves, and white, or yellowish flowers, inhabits low trees in moist parts of Porto Rico.
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Discussion
Orchid Family Epidendrum utricularioides Swartz, Prodromus Descriptionum Vegetabilium 122. 1788. Ionopsis utricularioides Lindley, Collecteana Botanica, plate 39A.1825.